


Go Gently

by Evandar



Series: Supernatural Drabbles and Ficlets [4]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Death Fic, Death from Old Age, End of the Happy Ending, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-13
Updated: 2015-06-13
Packaged: 2018-04-04 06:12:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4127877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Evandar/pseuds/Evandar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When his death does eventually come, Dean's a lot more accepting than he had been in his youth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Go Gently

Dean's pretty spry for an old guy, and honestly? He's pretty damn _old_. Discounting the forty years he spent in Hell, which he tries to do, eighty nine is a lot longer than he ever expected to live. He thought he'd die young in a blaze of glory, go out gun blazing with a spirit or a wendigo ripping out his guts. 

He did die young, but it wasn't permanent. Cas was responsible for bringing him back. Dean suspects he's responsible for the spry-ness too, but if he is, Cas has developed enough sense over the years to pretend that it's the nasty-ass tea he makes Dean drink that keeps arthritis away instead of a touch of angelic grace. 

They live together now. Cas flits off to Heaven every so often, but he's spent the most part of the last fifty-odd years on earth. With Dean. Dean, who let himself stop questioning it after a while, and learned to enjoy it instead. It's easier not waiting for the other shoe to drop, less painful. 

It strikes Dean, sometimes, that he's turned into a lighter replica of Bobby somewhere down the line. A cantankerous old hunter, stuffed full of lore and sarcasm. The biggest difference is that Dean is sober. For his _health_. You'd think Cas wants him to live forever with the way he goes on about it. 

He knows he won't. Even Cas can't stop time completely. But it's when he's on the phone to some kid called Billy-Jo - a kid who's ass-deep in changelings, by the sound of it - when he gets an inkling that his mortal coil is running out. 

It's nothing much. Just a tingling in his left hand that he would have been able to ignore if he hadn't spotted a familiar face in the corner of his eye. But Tessa is gone when he turns to look, and saving a bunch of kids is more important than something he may or may not have seen, so when Cas flaps back down from Heaven, Dean doesn't bother to mention it. 

Besides, "my heart started giving out today, honey," is a bit morbid even for him. 

So it's another thing that gets brushed aside - that he'll try and avoid talking about as much as he can, even though dying is something he's pretty sure people discuss with their life-partners at some point. God knows he talked about it with Sam enough before the end. The real end. The one where it was cancer that took his baby brother out instead of a knife in the back or a swan-dive into Hell. 

He's not sure where Sam went after. Like his own death, it's something he won't mention to Cas just in case the answer isn't the one he wants. 

The tingles in his hand get stronger every day. They spread up his arm and Tessa's face gets clearer and clearer; sometimes, he thinks she answers him when he makes the mistake of acknowledging her presence. Cas gets clearer too - he's always thought Cas was gorgeous, but now? He fights on every day for another look at those baby blues. 

The day Dean dies, he wakes up to a canopy of feathers and knows that he's beyond help. Cas' hand is a warm weight on his chest, and the wing that covers him is dark grey with blue speckles, and as beautiful as it is, he knows damn sure that he shouldn't be able to see it. He wants to touch, to find out if those feathers are as soft as they look, but his arms feel too heavy to move and his ribs feel like they've been stamped on. 

He’s not ready – doesn’t want this to be the end – so he grits his teeth and forces his body to keep going. Just a little longer. He doesn't want to die in Cas' arms - not when his angel is sleeping, anyway; waking up to find your lover cold beside you would be the worst and Cas doesn't deserve that. Not when he's got his hand resting over Dean's heart like he's checking for a pulse. 

Slowly, the wing fades from sight. So does Tessa, who was waiting behind it. Dean meets her gaze before she vanishes from view. She's not angry. He likes to think it's because she knows him too well. 

He spends the rest of his last day on earth reading a book on angelic lore on the front porch, basking in the warmth. He barely acknowledges passing neighbours, even the ones he likes - he's too focussed on the notes Cas has made in the margins. All the truths of Heaven scrawled in blue ballpoint on a book that's older than the town they ended up settling in. Half of them, he doesn't bother reading. He's read them all already; it's the sight of Cas' writing that's holding his interest more than the words. 

Tessa sits next to him. "I'm glad you found the peace you were looking for, Dean," she says, and it's the first time he's heard her clearly since his out-of-body experience during the Apocalypse. "But it's time for you to move on."

He grimaces. "Not out here," he says. He doesn't want the neighbour's kid to come poking at him with a stick. 

He pushes himself up, braces himself on the back of the chair as dizziness swims over him and his chest contracts. But it passes - this time - and he picks up his book and shuffles back indoors. 

"Let me guess," he says. "Too many damn cheeseburgers."

"They haven't helped," Tess replies. "But you're old, Dean. It's been a good life."

"Tell me about it," he mutters, but he knows she's right. And it's true. It has been good. Most of it. Mostly the latter part with Cas by his side and Sam...content with his lot. Sam hadn't married, hadn't had kids, hadn't found the 'normal' he'd so desperately wanted when they were kids, but he'd been happy in the end. 

And Cas. Eternally young, eternally beautiful Castiel. Dean likes to think he's made his angel happy too - certainly happy enough for him to stick around even after everyone started mistaking him for Dean's son instead of his partner. 

He doesn't have the energy to make it up the stairs so he settles instead in his favourite chair in the living room - the recliner with the Magic Fingers that Cas had got him half as a joke and half out of concern for Dean's back as he aged. 

He puts the book on the table next to him, folds his glasses on top of them. The room blurs but Tessa is clearer and closer than ever. 

The thought occurs to him that Cas is going to come home and find him like this. That there's pie in the fridge that he'll never get to eat and that he never did get to see the Grand Canyon after all... That Cas is going to have to go through the motions of being human without him, that he'll have to arrange a funeral and sell the house, and that Dean won't be there to comfort him with dumb one-liners or kisses pressed into his hair. 

"Dean," Tessa says. "It's time."

It is time. It's past time and he knows it, and sitting comfortably in the best chair in existence is far better than being ripped apart by Hellhounds. And Cas...Cas will be fine. 

It's not like Dean won't see him again. 

"Then what are you waiting for?" he asks. 

Tessa smiles at him and reaches out. And as his lungs tighten and his heart spasms and flutters, he feels her fingers brush lightly over his cheek.


End file.
